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Whitbread announces massive £1.5bn expansion plans
Whitbread has revealed a five-year expansion plan that could cost the company up to £1.5bn.
The company announced the plans, which involve doubling its Costa Coffee chain and expanding Premier Inn by 50 per cent, in its preliminary results for the year to 28 February.
Whitbread’s chief executive, Alan Parker, said: “2007/08 was a year of excellent progress with good results across the company. We are now a more resilient business with strong growth prospects in the UK and overseas. In anticipation of a more challenging environment, action has been taken to simplify processes and reduce costs.
“Since the start of the new financial year, two months ago, trading has been encouraging. We have researched the opportunities for disciplined growth across the group and have established two longer-term ambitions -– to increase the size of Premier Inn by 50 per cent to 55,000 rooms and to double Costa to 2,000 stores in the next five years.”
The company reported that pre-tax profit increased 26 per cent to £210.3m, with total revenue up 11.3 per cent to £1.29bn.
Meanwhile, Parker commented today (28 April) on BBC News on the much-reported Travelodge takeover, saying that while the strategy was sound, the “price just wasn’t right”.
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